Asus A716 Giveaway

[Gerard]

Where to begin... Well, the battery life is self-evident in it's wonderful possibilies. I like accessory PPC cameras, and have used those from Casio, HP, and Pretec. If I had this Asus I would save up for a Veo SD camera (not hard, as they're pretty reasonable), with it's apparently great software package and nearly perfect video capture features. I take a lot of pictures, and not having to charge my PPC while away camping for a couple of days while getting lots of snaps and little videos would be awesome!

I'm also hoping to find a decent deal on a CF GSM/GPRS card soon, to dump my local phone pirate company in favour of using the same number I've had for 15 years, with a good wireless provider. I've never had a cellphone, though I've borrowed one recently and liked it a lot. Roving phone access and data capabilities through my Pocket PC would be my personal 'killer app.' Again, that extended battery would make this far more useful, as both cameras and phone cards eat through power like I go through popcorn at a good movie.

More and more local coffee shops are incorporating high-speed wireless access, often free with a snack. I'd use the built-in wireless tools to gain fast access to larger files than I'd want to download or upload via FTP (the new Resco FTP client is GREAT, though FtpView still works fine too) over a slower GSM/GPRS connection. Finally I'd get in on the streaming media revolution. It's been a bit painful, three and a half years of dialup...

The CF II slot is necessary to access my Accurite hard drive, via a PC>CF card adapter. I've used the 6GB model since November of 2000, and though the LI-Ion battery is getting a bit weak these days it's still a flawless and secure place to keep the bulk of my data. I hope one day to upgrade to Accurite's 20GB model, and will still need a CF II slot for that. Too few newer PPC models have this feature, which seems silly, so I'm glad to see it included in this new Asus.

I post a lot in the forums. I like helping people. With remote access, I could be browsing for newbie questions and intricate registry problems and the like while otherwise wasting time riding a bus, or waiting in line somewhere, answering questions I might otherwise miss. I've recently started technical writing professionally, adding a chapter on logic attacks on CE devices to an upcoming book, and hope to expand on this mini-career. Having one of the latest devices running WM2003 would bring me up to speed, compared to my clunky old 3835 iPAQ running PPC2002. I'd be better equipped to help people, to better understand the specific issues with the new OS. It'd be nice to have a device that was WM2004-ready, too.

Those are the big reasons I'd like to have this Asus. Besides that, there's my perennial broke-ass self, just hoping a free PPC might come swooping in to save the day. My old Casio EG-800's CF slot died last year, rendering it pretty close to useless (though my step-daughter loves it for drawing on, so it's hers now), and this iPAQ 3835 has recently taken to hard resetting itself once in a while, possibly due to a defective connector with a short when I jack it into the Stowaway. The battery life's pretty sad too, and there's something weird about how the unit is reading the battery with the MemPlug sleeve on. I've see this error that the battery has been completely drained 3 times in the past months, that I should soft reset and recalibrate the battery. That's at full charge. I'm hoping it'll keep going a while longer, as there's just no way I'm going to earn enough money to get another PPC any time soon.

[Gerard]

And yes, I admit it, I only joined because I noticed the contest on Thoughts. But hey, now that I'm here, I'm happy to be here!

[Guest]

Wow. The A716 is great looking.
Balancing the good and bad, the bad looks like size; but with such a feature rich device, who can complain.
I would like this for the improvments over the Dell Axim X5 that I currently have.
The D Pad sounds better than the Axim's;
having two card slots AND WiFi ... Wow!
with the improved battery life I wouldn't have to worry about running low.
It would even give me the opportunity to investigate bluetooth addons.
This looks like a step up for me, and I would use it to replace my Axim for everyday PPC uses, and playing music, games and web browsing.

[Mr. Cancelled]

As my girlfriend would point out, I spend a lot of time on my various PC's. I'm always working on a project, or tweaking this system or that, or simply bringing home work to handle once I'm out of the workplace.

Having a pocket PC such as this would allow me to automatically sync many of these devices up, in addition to allowing me to do some of my work "on the go".

Which in the long run would mean more time to spend with the aforementioned girlfriend, hang out with friends, and basically get more of my life back.

Being able to arrange my thoughts, and projects, in addition to contacts and daily items (shopping notes, appointments, contacts, emails, etc) would allow me to free up at least a couple of hours a day.

As a rather simple example, if I send work home, I'll often come home, get online to retrieve what I've sent myself. Then if it's development work, I have to manually move that over to my Dev box, work on it, and then reverse this process to send it back in to work. Additionally, related contacts and emails take even more time away from "my life".

It would be heaven to simply walk into my house, have my Pocket PC 'automagically' sync to all my home boxes, sending any emails I've penned, downloading any items I've specified, etc., and then spend some time watching TV with the girlfriend on the couch for a change (all the while being able to respond to the odd email or change as they come in via my DSL connection and are automatically sent to my Pocket PC, which would of course be downstairs by the couch).

So that's what I would do with this: Get some of my life back.

[uzziah0]

[James S]

[supergoofy]

[cbgold]

As an elementary school teacher (6th grade) I would use this device to enhance the communications that are so vital between parents and teachers. Nothing is more important to the success of the child in school then effective, timely, communication between home and school. The problem is that with today's demographics, it is so difficult to open these channels of communication, and then keep them open. One solution I've found is to use email. The problem is getting to a computer at my end, since my students are always using the computers in school when they are available. This device would solve that problem and enable me to contact the parents whenever I needed to and allow then to contact me.

I also would love to be able to bring my students into this millenium by showing them how to do research on the Pocket PC and the Internet. There is no doubt in my mind that this type of configuration will one day replace expensive and quickly outdated text books.

Finally, it would help me with all of the administrative tasks a teacher must face daily. From grading (easily set up on a spreadsheet) to letter writing (word processing) to the inventory of texts and supplies (data base), all this could be accomplished in the palm of my hand. Information on every student, who is alergic to what, what their special needs are, etc., will be readily available to me at all times. This would free me up from the administrative quagmire every teacher faces daily, and allow me to spend more time on what I do best. Being the best teacher I can be for my students.

[marcelol]

How do you answer something like that ?

Answer: For practically everything. Here's a typical day....

I can use it to look up my email at home via the office WiFi lan (if I grease the right palm to add the unit's mac address to the list of allowed adapters ), and not suffer from the "using my office computer for personal purposes" stigma. I can RSS the latest updates to techbargains or some other bargain/news site, so I can jump on a good deal when I see one. When it's time to go, I can zap whatever I was working on the my CF card ( or CF harddrive ), and take it home. And if I'm going out and I'm at a hotspot ( bookstore, Starbucks ), jump on their WiFi, and listen to some Internet radio station than their canned Muzak music. If I'm not at a hotspot location, with Bluetooth, I can just have my bluetooth phone dial up my GPRS connection, and voila, I'm surfing again, albeit more slowly. Either way, I can look up what's showing at the local theater, and buy my tickets online if I'm running late to the movie. With options like CF and SD, I can grab some dirt cheap memory, install my programs to the CF card, and maybe some music to the SD card ( or vice versa, there's that CF Hard drive option< not that I can afford it right now>....who says you need an IPOD ! ) so I can have my fav programs, along with a few hours of music with me at all times. Then again, I can always log back into the network at home through the net, and update my playlist with whatever I want via FTP. With SDIO I can always pop on a digicam to it, and save my pictures to the CF card, or immediately post them back to my website. There's always the myriad of connections that you can make from it to your PC, you can sync via USB, Bluetooth or WiFi across the network. With WiFi and BT, I can even check my calendar or my outlook account on the office's exchange server. Then, of course, there's fun time, with a 400Mhz processor and plenty of ram available on board, you whip up your favorite level of Doom, Quake, or what have you and blow off some stress from a hard days work. Arriving home, I can use the IR support built in, and use UltraMote to turn to whatever channel I want on the TV. If nothing good is on, I could always use it to stream music from one of the other machine's on the WiFi network at home, or turn on the stereo/cd player to whatever I left in the unit. Once I've done that, I can go to PapaJohn's online ( or something similar ) and order a pizza for that well-earned meal from their website. Then I can log on to my dwindling checking account, and pay my bills through the banks e-pay system. Then use whatever I put on the CF card to continue work for that meeting tomorrow ( oh joy ! ), I could just access it via WiFi, but I'm not a masochist, so I pop the card out just long enough to work on it. And then return it to it's proper place in the PPC when I'm done. Just before going to bed, I turn on the news in the bedroom, using UltraMote, and set the Sleep function on the Tube, and set the unit to charge again ( not that after all that use it still wouldn't have a fair bit of charge left to it ). Finally, I don't have to worry about recharging my PPC all the time, and I blissfully go to sleep. Only to be awakened, after what seems like too short a sleep, by the scheduled alarm I set in Pocket Outlook to wake me up every day. Here we go, another day with the Asus 716.

There's really only one place that it couldn't necessarily come in handy, and that's the rest room. I don't want to think what a PPC for Restrooms would be like.

Marcelo

[Jenster]

Wow, this looks great. As a parent on the go, I could use this to co-ordinate all my children's appointments/schedules, and mine. I work out of my car - so to speak, I am in and out of stores and only have a home office. I could go completely paperless with Wi-Fi and send my documents at once instead of waiting to get home and syncing with my computer and then attaching it to an e-mail. Simplicty rules. With BT, I wouldn't even need a cradle. While I am "bored" I can play games, this will be awesome for gaming, too.

Plus everyone will be so envious.

[Jenster]

Wow, this looks great. As a parent on the go, I could use this to co-ordinate all my children's appointments/schedules, and mine. I work out of my car - so to speak, I am in and out of stores and only have a home office. I could go completely paperless with Wi-Fi and send my documents at once instead of waiting to get home and syncing with my computer and then attaching it to an e-mail. Simplicty rules. With BT, I wouldn't even need a cradle. While I am "bored" I can play games, this will be awesome for gaming, too.

Plus everyone will be so envious.

[Hammerhead]

[aximmaxim]

[mamono]

[Alow]

How would you best take advantage of all the features the a716 offers?

I will take it with me to the toilet, and do a long poopy. No worries to not be able to talk with my friends, and no worries to not be able to surf to my current thoughts, just no worries at all. Now I will be connected.